Please Hear What I'm Not Saying
Don't be fooled by me.Don't be fooled by the face I wear.
For I wear a mask, I wear a thousand masks,
masks that I am afraid to take off,
and none of them are me.
Pretending is an art that is second nature with me,
but don't be fooled,
for God's sake don't be fooled.
I give you the impression that I'm secure,
that all is sunny and unruffled with me,
within me as well as without,
that confidence is my name and coolness my game,
that the water's calm and I'm in command,
and that I need no one.
But don't believe me, please.
My surface may seem smooth but my surface is my mask,
ever-varying and ever-concealing.
Beneath lies no complacence.
Beneath lies confusion and fear and aloneness.
But I hide this. I don't want anybody to know it.
I panic at the thought of my weakness and fear being exposed.
that is why I frantically create a mask to hide beind,
a nonchalant sophisticated charade,
to help me pretend,
to shield me from the glance that knows.
But such a glance is my salvation.
My only hope and I know it.
That is, if it's followed by acceptance,
if it's followed by love.
It's the only thing that can liberate me from myself,
from my own self-built prison walls,
from the barriers I so painstakingly erect.
It's the only thing that will assure me of what I can't assure myself,
that I'm really worth something.
But I don't tell you this. I don't dare to. I'm afraid to.
I'm afraid that your glance will not be followed by acceptance,
will not be followed by love.
I'm afraid that you'll think less of me, that you'll laugh,
and your laugh would kill me.
I'm afraid that deep-down I'm nothing, that I'm just no good,
and that you will see this and reject me.
So I play my game, my desperate pretending game,
with a facade of assurance without
and a trembling child within.
So begins the glittering but empty parade of masks,
and my life becomes a front.
I idly chatter to you in the suave tones of surface talk.
I tell you everything that's really nothing,
and nothing of what's everything,
of what's crying within me.
So when I'm going through my routine,
do not be fooled by what I'm saying.
Please listen carefully and try to hear what I'm not saying,
what I'd like to be able to say,
what for survival I need to say,
but what I can't say.
I don't like to hide.
I don't like to play superficial phoney games.
I want to stop playing them.
I want to be genuine and spontaneous and me,
but you've got to help me.
You've got to hold out your hand
even when that's the last thing I seem to want.
Only you can wipe away from my eyes the blank stare of the
breathing dead.
Only you can call me into aliveness.
Each time you're kind and gentle and encouraging,
each time you try to understand because you really care,
my heart begins to grow wings,
very small wings,
very feeble wings,
but wings!
With your power to touch me into feeling
you can breathe life into me.
I want you to know that.
I want you to know how important you are to me,
how you can be a creator - an honest-to-God creator -
of the person who is me
if you chose to.
You alone can break down the wall behind which I tremble,
you alone can remove my mask,
you alone can release me from my shadow-world of panic
and uncertainy, from my lonely prison,
if you choose to.
Please choose to. Do not pass me by.
It will not be easy for you.
A long conviction of worthlessness builds strong walls.
The nearer you approach to me
The blinder I may strike back.
It's irrational.
I fight against the very thing that I cry out for.
But I am told that love is stronger than strong walls,
and in this lies my hope.
Please try to beat down those walls
with firm hands
but with gentle hands
for a child is very sensitive.
Who am I, you may wonder?
I am someone you know very well.
For I am every man you meet
and I am every woman you meet.
~~~Author Unknown~~~
Child Abuse is an International Problem.
Do Your Part
STOP CHILD ABUSE!!
The more of us that work together to stop abuse, the closer we come, one heart at a time, to ending the heinous crimes upon our children. All children have the right to be loved and be given hugs that mean caring, and support that is encouraging and a childhood free of fear and reprisal. We can all make a difference if we try. If the world is educated to the horrors of abuse and its ramifications and far reaching effects, then we are helping our children.
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